Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about the Council’s handling of an Education, Health and Care plan review. This is because the Complainant has appeal to the tribunal about the content of the plan and the law prevents us from also considering this issue. The Council has apologised for delays, poor communication and not consulting certain schools. The remaining injustice is insufficient to warrant further investigation, and it is unlikely that we would achieve anything more for the complainant.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complained about the Council’s handling of her son’s Education, Health and Care (EHC) plan review. She says the Council has:
• Delayed carrying out the annual review,
• Delayed issuing a final EHC plan,
• Failed to name a special school as agreed,
• Failed to consult parental preference schools,
• Held the placement panel after the EHC plan had been issued, and
• Provided poor communication.
2. She says this has resulted in her son being placed at an unsuitable school that cannot meet his needs.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
4. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone has a right of appeal, reference or review to a tribunal about the same matter. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to use this right. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
5. The First-tier Tribunal (Special Educational Needs and Disability) considers appeals against council decisions regarding special educational needs. We refer to it as the Tribunal in this decision statement.
6. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide:

• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement, or
• we could not add to any previous investigation by the organisation.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

7. I considered information provided by the complainant.
8. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

9. Mrs X’s main complaint is about the school named in the EHC plan and her belief this is unsuitable. Parents unhappy with the content of an EHC plan have the right of appeal to the tribunal. Mrs X has appealed the Council’s decision about the school named in the EHC plan. As set out in paragraph 4, we cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appeal to a tribunal about the same matter.
10. The Council has accepted there were delays, issues with communication and a failure to consult parental preferences. The Council has issued Mrs X with an apology. I do not consider the remaining injustice to be significant enough to justify us investigating and further investigation is unlikely to achieve anything more.

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Final decision

11. We will not investigate Mrs X’s complaint because she has appeal to the tribunal in relation to the substantive part of her complaint and it is unlikely an investigation by us would achieve anything more for the remaining parts of her complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman